Best Pitch Practices
1) THE VIBE GREETING
Hi _________! My name is (your name), How are you doing on this (mon-fri, morning/afternoon)?
Option 2:
Hi _________! My name is (your name), I hope you’re doing awesome today!
2) THE VIBE RESPONSE
If they are:
Well great! I love your vibe. Sounds like you’re doing well.
If they are NOT:
Well, all things considered, you sound like you’re doing well. I love your vibe.
3) TRANSITION TO “IT MEANS A LOT”
Well listen, I do want to say that I know you reached out to us via Bark/Thumbtack and the way those guys work, your phone is probably heating up right now because even though there’s only 4-5 of us calling you, some of these firms will call you 3-4 times and email, etc., making it kind of overwhelming – so again, I really want to thank you for allowing you and I this time to talk and discuss your needs. It really does mean a lot.
4) INVITE THEM TO SHARE WHAT THEIR DESIGN NEEDS ARE
…well great. Well __________ my job right now is to help you whether we end up doing business or not. If we do, awesome. If not, then if I can at least help or provide you with some good ideas and knowledge then that works as well. So let’s give you the floor so that you can fill me in on what you’re looking for and I’ll do my best to give you some good feedback and options.
5) DISCOVERY
Just listen and note what THEY say they want. Don’t worry as much about what YOU know they need. Try to address pages/nav/functionality like normal (enough so that you’ll know how to quote something) but try to keep things simple and allow some room to ask them at appropriate intervals if THEY would like to hear WHY they might want more than the 3-4 pages they often come up with.
Remember, that they usually come to the conversation wanting cheap. Talking about the website you know they need is counter to their desires.
6) SEQUE INTO TIMELINE / DECISION TIMING
_____________ on the inquiry that you submitted I noticed that you didn’t say anything about timeline. If you find that we are a great fit with the look & feel for the website and the budget works – is this something that you are looking to get going on over the next couple of days or today? …or are you just kind of thinking about this for some time down the road? Can you kind of speak to what your timeline looks like and when you’d like to see the new website LIVE?
7) FIRST RESPONSE AFTER DISCOVERY. Everything is About Being a Fit.
First of all, __________in terms of working with you, as I said before – everything is about being a fit. I know that you’re hearing (or going to be hearing) from several design companies and we’re all telling you how great we are and I know many will be low-ball quoting and promising things they can’t possibly deliver just to get your business. We are just not built that way.
We can build you a cheap website and it will look awesome, but it will be kind of like putting up a beautiful billboard on a dirt road in the middle of nowhere. We try to educate and do a bit more to ensure that our client’s websites are productive.
Based on our conversation and the pages and functionality we talked about, we might be able to develop it for a little less, but I think you’re probably looking at $$$$ SHARE THE QUOTE $$$$.
…and ____________ that includes making the website secure for Google purposes, and mobile-friendly for all browsers and phones. It also ensures that we won’t just use some generic template or bland photos, etc. We will work with you to share some links to some beautiful new layouts for 2021 and 2022. That includes collaborating with you on color palette and font choices as well as looking at photos and videos via Shutterstock where we will license high rez imagery at no cost to you. You’ll have an easy-to-use backend or dashboard that will allow YOU to add, edit and delete photos, text, videos and BLOG and do the things you’re going to want to do to make your website productive.
8) DON’T STOP YET! ABSENT OF VALUE, IT IS ALL ABOUT PRICE.
WHY IS APPNET THE BEST FIT?
_______, I mentioned earlier I want to tell you WHY I think Appnet is your best fit. I know that you reached out to us via Bark and hopefully you looked at our profile and all the others who are reaching out to you.
We have fun sharing the fact that we’ve been in the business of web design for 26 years – longer than there’s even been a Google. We’ve been the most hired web design company for the last ten years or so via two national and international referral agencies – Bark/Thumbtack being one of those. We’ve got several hundred reviews and it’s almost embarrassing – I told someone the other day that I kind of wish we had at least ONE, 1-star review buried somewhere because it almost doesn’t look real as we have a rating of Five Stars out of Five Stars.
On top of all that if you want to take a second and search Google for things like “Guaranteed Search Engine Ranking”, several firms buy their way up top by spending money with Google Adwords, but we rank NUMBER ONE organically without spending a penny and we bring that to the table to work for you.
9) ARE YOU THEIR BEST FIT? NOW TELL THEM YOU ARE.
Last, __________, I know it may sound a little old-fashioned or hokey, but I’d love to work with you and will promise you one thing. If you will trust me with your business, I will work diligently to make the design process as easy on you as possible and I’ll be a great resource to help make your website productive. As I mentioned earlier, we’ve worked with so many type of business clients and I know of some really sweet looking layouts and we can knock this out of the park for you.
10) ARE THEY A FIT?
So in terms of “being a fit”, I am confident of that. What I don’t know is if we are a fit budgetwise. I know that in your inquiry you…
This is where you’ll need to adjust this part of the conversation based on IF they shared a budget range or not. If they did, then you can address it directly. If they did not share a price range, then you’ll need to address it differently.
See options.
If they shared a budget:
I noticed in your inquiry that you shared that your budget was $$$$
and if that is the case, we need to discuss that further or we may
not be a fit. Can you speak to that for a second?
If they DID NOT share a budget:
In terms of working with you, I’d love to, but can you touch on the
costs. Is what we’ve talked about do-able or in your price range?
11) ADD ON OR CLOSE…
If they reply favorably…then you COULD ADD ON.
That said, depending on your budget, if you can spend just a little bit more I can show you how we can do more to make sure that you show up on Google, etc. Is that something you want to hear about?
If they sound negative about the price quote you will need to either simply share that we’re not a fit unless you have room to drop the price a little or you will need to share how working with us is different and worth a lot more.
The reason for the last paragraph in BLUE. I added the last paragraph as a trap of sorts. Without it or directly asking whether your quote is in their range or do-able, they may just default to “send me something” with no intention of working with you at all. THIS is where you have to qualify/disqualify.
BEFORE JUST SENDING A PROPOSAL…
We all have to send proposals to prospective clients. When you have gotten to that point and the proposal is the only option, then at least close with this statement.
Absolutely I will send you a proposal. Can I ask one question before I do? Obviously, we talked about the website and I provided a quote. Does that quote fit your expectations and ability? I say that only because if I send you a proposal and it is not where you need to be in terms of costs, then we’re wasting your time. If we need to discuss cutting some things or paring the site back a little to get costs down, let me know. Can you speak to that?
These are only a few critical moments that YOU can control the dialog that WILL make something great happen way more often than not.
You will still need to address what the prospect wants for their website and paint the picture of the website. You will still want to share WHY APPNET, OUR AMMO and why we are such a great fit. You will still want to address where we may not be a fit and address the budget.